Southwest says technology outage fixed but more flights cut

by Associated Press

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EL PASO, Texas (CBS4) —

Southwest said it has mostly fixed computer problems that caused hundreds of flights to be canceled or delayed, but the airline warned passengers that there could be long lines at airports on Thursday.

The line for Southwest at the El Paso International Airport became shorter as of Thursday afternoon.

Several delays and cancellations on the flight screens were up on the screen overnight when CBS4 arrived.

Several passengers who were flying out to Dallas said they had been waiting for more than an hour and were anxiously waiting for more answers.

Although their flights were cancelled, they were still hopeful to leave the Borderland by Thursday night.

Southwest said it has mostly fixed computer problems that caused hundreds of flights to be canceled or delayed, but the airline warned passengers that there could be long lines at airports on Thursday.

The airline hoped to bounce back partly by reducing its load — Southwest canceled more than 300 flights, or about 5 percent of its schedule, early on Thursday.

The airline said "most systems are back online" after problems that began with an outage Wednesday afternoon and continued intermittently well into the night.

"We know we disappointed customers today. We are really, really sorry about that," spokeswoman Linda Rutherford said in a video that the airline posted Wednesday night. "That is unacceptable to us."

The airline said that it was trying to accommodate stranded passengers on new flights. Because of that, it expected long lines and told passengers to arrive early for Thursday flights.

Southwest officials said they had not identified the cause of the outage. Several of the airline's technology systems were affected for several hours. The airline briefly held up all departing flights on Wednesday, and its website and electronic check-in systems failed.

After a similar outage last October resulted in 800 delayed flights, Southwest blamed a faulty software application.